Hidden Undercurrents

Earth Land, Ishgar, Kingdom of Fiore, Clover.

June, x784.

The group of wizards and knights endured the uncomfortable conversation between Darkness and Virgo for another half an hour. Fortunately, the Custody Enforcement Unit, led by Lahar, arrived, putting an end to the awkward atmosphere.

After taking statements and detaining Erigor and Kageyama, the members of the unit boarded their air ship where the other members of Eisenwald were also detained. Before they left, however, Lahar looked at Alfonzo and Ultear, who fought Lullaby, and told them that their reward for defeating one of the Books of Zeref would be delivered in a few days.

A few minutes later, the captain of the knights also ordered the division to return to base. He had to literally drag Darkness away, though. She was unwilling to leave her new friend and put up quite the resistance. In the end, however, she was eventually taken away with a combined effort from all the knights.

After that, the guild masters returned to the annual meeting. Today was the last day and they wanted to see it through to the end. At the same time, Cana, Gray, Erza, Natsu, Happy, and Lucy gathered with Alfonzo and Ultear.

"I guess you'll be taking the train back to Magnolia, right?" Alfonzo asked once everyone else had left.

"That's right." Erza replied with a nod. "If there weren't so many of us, I would ask if you could give us a ride back, though."

"I wanna ride home with you, though, Fonzie." Cana said with a pout.

"What are you saying, Cana?" Natsu asked in confusion. "We started this quest together; shouldn't we finish it like that?"

"I wanna spend time with my fiancé, what's wrong with that?" Cana asked with a slight frown.

"But it looks like they were on a… date." Lucy said, replying to Cana instead of Natsu, who was clearly at a loss for words. "Yeah let's call it a date… Do you really wanna get in the way of that? How would you feel if you were in Ultear's shoes?"

While Ultear gave Lucy a grateful smile, Cana glanced at Ultear, then at Alfonzo, eventually sighing in resignation.

"Fine, I get it." Cana said with a pout.

"Don't worry, Cana." Alfonzo said, drawing nearer to Cana. "I promise you'll get some alone time with me soon."

"You better keep that promise." Cana said before grabbing Alfonzo by the front of his shirt and pulling him in for a kiss.

Smiling at Cana affectionately after breaking the kiss, Alfonzo also pulled Erza into a hug and kissed her, too. While Cana was licking her lips, looking forward to more, Erza was lightly blushing at the public display of affection.

Meanwhile, Natsu had paled at the thought of getting back in the magic vehicle then having to take a train back to Magnolia while Gray was too busy thinking about Ultear's [Rosen Krone] spell to think about anything else. Lucy, on the other hand, watched Alfonzo, Cana, Ultear, and Erza with a bit of envy.

'*Sigh* When will I get a boyfriend?' Lucy thought to herself. 'They look so happy. Maybe I should go on a man hunt… But then again, Alfonzo seems to like me. And why wouldn't he? I mean, look at me. But he's a playboy. Then again, what Cana said makes sense. Is he really a playboy if all the girls know about each other and agreed to share him? Maybe I should consider sharing him, too.'

"Well, I think it's time we get going." Erza said, her face still a little red. "We should probably find a hotel in town. Then, we can head out in the morning."

"Sounds good to me." Cana said while stretching, intentionally showing off her curves to Alfonzo. "We've been running around all day. I'm exhausted."

"I'd be exhausted if I drank that much in a day, too." Lucy muttered.

"Lightweight." Cana shot back.

A moment later, Cana, Gray, Erza, Natsu, Happy, and Lucy were all about to climb back into the magic vehicle. However, before they could, Ultear asked a question that made them all stop.

"Hey, Alfonzo, I was wondering about this ever since you took out Erigor with one spell." Ultear said in a curious tone. "If you could beat Erigor so easily, why did the fight with those mercenary brothers earlier this month take so much effort?"

Naturally, Alfonzo and Elicia had told Cana and Ultear, since Erza and Sun were away on quests, about the quest they took with Lucy when they returned. Naturally, they found it strange that the Vanish Brothers seemed to give Alfonzo some trouble when they knew how strong he was.

"Well, as you know, I try to keep property damage to a minimum, right?" Alfonzo asked, receiving a nod from the rest of the group. "If I had fought them with the intent to finish the fight quickly, I would have destroyed at least the entire library. Hurling chunks of metal or firing off EM phenomena causes a lot of collateral damage, after all."

"Oh, that makes sense." Ultear replied with a nod.

"I don't know why you even bother with that." Cana said while shaking her head. "Quests would get finished a lot faster if you just went all out."

In response to Cana's careless response, Alfonzo could only smile wryly and shake his head. It was already clear that using the guild's reputation as a reason wouldn't work, the entire guild seemed to not care about that in the slightest. And it was not like he could refuse to cook for his fiancée… Or could he? Either way, he had no intention of beating a dead horse to get his point across.

A few moments later, the six wizards left, going into the town of Clover to find a hotel where they would spend the night. Meanwhile, Alfonzo and Ultear returned to the Escalade and waited for the meeting to end.

About an hour later, the guild masters started pouring out of the building. Alfonzo noticed the glare coming from Jose Porla, but chose to ignore it. He was sure that he could fight and possibly defeat Jose if he had to, but he had no reason to do so at the moment.

After another half an hour, Makarov finally climbed into the back seat of the Escalade after bidding his friends farewell. Then, Alfonzo started driving back toward Magnolia.

Earth Land, Ishgar, Era.

"I can't believe those damn Fairy Tail wizards." Crawford Seam said after reading the report about the Eisenwald attack. "They destroyed the Oshibana Station."

"Destroyed is a bit of a strong word, isn't it?" Yajima said with a wry smile. "The report says that there are only a few scorch marks in the main hall and a few walls and a statue were broken while they fought an entire Dark Guild."

"Hmph!" Org snorted in disdain. "The only reason you speak on their behalf is because you used to be a member of that that guild of troublemakers."

"Fairy Tail's cases of property destruction have reduced greatly over the last two years." Yajima argued. "Surely you can see that."

"Now, now, now." A blue haired young man with a tattoo under his right eye said before the argument could get too heated. "What Yajima says is true. That's something you can't deny."

This young man and a beautiful, young woman with strawberry-blonde hair, light blue eyes, and an exaggerated hourglass figure who stood next to him were the youngest members of the current Magic Council. While both of them smiled kindly at the other members of the council, neither of them appeared to be taking sides in the argument.

"Siegrain, you disappoint me." Org said with anger in his tone. "How can you not see the menace that Fairy Tail represents for Ishgar."

"So, the fact that they are changing for the better has no bearing on the way you treat them at all, does it?" Yajima shouted, unable to stand the bias attitude of the top two members of the Magic Council.

"Hmph!" Org replied with a snort. "Your blatant show of favoritism toward your former guild is unbecoming of someone in an impartial group such as the Magic Council."

Once again, Org and Yajima's argument began. This time, instead of trying to calm the situation, the blue haired young man, Siegrain, only shook his head before leaving the meeting hall with the strawberry-blonde woman following after him.

Eventually arriving at a small break room, Siegrain and the strawberry blonde woman sat down.

"With fools like those old coots reigning over the continents magical community, it's a wonder that the continent hasn't descended into anarchy." Siegrain said in a disdainful tone.

"That won't matter for long." The strawberry-blonde woman replied with a slightly insane glint in her eyes. "Once he returns, everything will change."

"*Sigh* I know you're right, Junko." Siegrain said in an exasperated tone. "But I get the urge to kill them when I see them acting like that. If it weren't for incompetent fools like them…"

"I understand how you feel." The strawberry-blonde woman, Junko Enoshima, said as she reached toward Siegrain and rested her hand on top of his. "It will all change after we revive him."

"You're right." Siegrain said, getting his facial expression back together. "Let's return. We don't want them doing anything that would throw a wrench in our plans."

Nodding in response, Junko stood up and followed Siegrain back to the meeting hall. However, since she was walking behind him, he never saw the glint in Junko's eyes.

'Once the plan succeeds and he is revived, I'll have him all to myself.' Junko thought to herself with an internal, insanity ridden smile. 'Then, with all his power at my disposal, I'll be able to shape this word into anything I desire. Oh, it will be so much fun. All the despair… Mmm… I can't wait.'

Earth Land, Ishgar, Kingdom of Fiore, Magnolia.

Shortly after midnight, Alfonzo and Ultear arrived at Alfonzo's mansion. Unsurprisingly, they were the only ones in the house. When they arrived, they found a note from Elicia telling them that she planned to stay in the orphanage in Hargeon for the night. Meanwhile, Sun was still out on her quest with Marin. At the same time, Cana and Erza would not be back until late tomorrow.

"It looks like it will be just the two of us tonight." Alfonzo said, placing the note back on the kitchen table.

"I was expecting Elicia to be here." Ultear muttered. "Well, I guess that's good for me. There shouldn't be any more interruptions."

"What did you say?" Alfonzo asked, not able to make out Ultear's muttering.

"Don't worry about it." Ultear replied with a smile and a slight blush. "Anyway, I think I wanna take a shower."

"A shower sounds great." Alfonzo replied. "After Lullaby's huge corpse fell, it kicked up a lot of dust. And a lot of it got in my hair."

"Okay, I'll see you later then." Ultear said, heading toward the stairs. "I'll come say good night when I'm done with my shower."

"Sure." Alfonzo said with a smile. "You know where to find me."

Like that, the two separated with Alfonzo heading toward the master bedroom, the master bathroom specifically, while Ultear went up to the guest room she normally stayed in when she spent the night at the mansion.

Shortly after arriving in the guest room, Ultear quickly undressed and threw her clothes in the laundry hamper. Now, completely naked with her fair, curvaceous body on full display, she looked into the closet where she kept a few sets of clothes. Reaching up to the shelf above where her clothes were hanging, she pulled out a small package.

After opening the package, Ultear set it on the bed. Carefully opening it, she saw a dark blue, silk robe with white and black accents and a white cross on the back laying inside.

"Tonight's the night." Ultear said to herself as she slowly put on the robe and tied the sash. "There will be no one to interrupt us. And even if there was, I have no intention of stopping."

Earth Land, Ishgar, Kingdom of Fiore, Hargeon.

At that moment, Elicia, who was sleeping in a bed in the staff quarters of the orphanage where her journey in this world started, opened her eyes. Then, in one, swift motion, she sat up and looked in Magnolia's direction.

"I need to go." Elicia said in n oddly determined tone. "Something is happening. I'm not sure what it is, but I know I don't want to miss it."

With that, Elicia quietly got up and made her way toward the matron's quarters to let her know about her sudden departure.